The Betrayal - E. Phillips Oppenheim (the snowy day read aloud txt) 📗

of so much feeling. When he resumed his seat and former attitude I could see that his face was almost gray.

"This is terrible news," he said. "I am not at all sure, though, Mr.
Ducaine, that any blame can attach itself to you."

"Your Grace," I answered, "there were three men only who knew the secret of that combination. One is yourself, another Colonel Ray, the third myself. I set the lock last night. I opened it this morning. I ask you, in the name of common sense, upon whom the blame is likely to fall? If I remain this will happen again. I cannot escape suspicion. It is not reasonable."

"The word was a common one," the Duke said half to himself. "Some one may have guessed it."

"Your Grace," I said, "is it likely that any one would admit the possibility of such a thing?"

"It may have been overheard."

"It has never been spoken," I reminded him. "It was written down, glanced at by all of us, and destroyed."

The Duke nodded.

"You are right," he admitted. "The inference is positive enough. The safe has been opened between the hours of ten at night and seven o'clock this morning by—"

"By either myself, Colonel Ray, or your Grace," I said.

"I am not sure that I am prepared to admit that," the Duke objected quietly.

"It is inevitable!" I declared.

"Only the very young use that word," the Duke said drily.

"I spoke only of what others must say," I answered.

"It is a cul de sac, I admit," the Duke said. "Nevertheless, Mr. Ducaine, I am not prepared without consideration to accept your resignation. I cannot see that our position would be improved in any way, and in my own mind I may add that I hold you absolved from suspicion."

I held myself a little more upright. The Duke spoke without enthusiasm, but with conviction.

"Your Grace is very kind," I answered gratefully, "but there are the others. They know nothing of me. It is inevitable that I should become an object of suspicion to them."

The Duke looked thoughtfully for several moments at the table before him. Then he looked up at me.

"Ducaine," he said, "I will tell you what I propose. You have done your duty in reporting this thing to me. Your duty ends there—mine begins. The responsibility, therefore, for our future course of action remains with me. You, I presume, are prepared to admit this."

"Certainly, your Grace," I answered.

"I see no useful purpose to be gained," the Duke continued, "in spreading this thing about. I believe that we shall do better by keeping our own counsel. You and I can work secretly in the matter. I may have some suggestions to make when I have considered it more fully; but for the present I propose that we treat the matter as a hallucination of yours. We shall hear in due course if this stolen information goes across the water. If it does—well, we shall know how to act."

"You mean this?" I asked breathlessly. "Forgive me, your Grace, but it means so much to me. You believe that we are justified?"

"Why not?" the Duke asked coldly. "It is I who am your employer. It is I who am responsible to the country for these things. You are responsible only to me. I choose that you remain. I choose that you speak of this matter only when I bid you speak."

To me it was relief immeasurable. The Duke's manner was precise, even cold. Yet I felt that he believed in me. I scarcely doubted but that he had suspicions of his own. I, at any rate, was not involved in them. I could have wrung him by the hand but for the inappropriateness of such a proceeding. So far as he was concerned I could see that the matter was already done with. His attention was beginning to wander to the mass of letters before him.

"Would you allow me to help your Grace with your correspondence?" I suggested. "I have no work at present."

The Duke shook his head impatiently.

"I thank you," he said. "My man of business will be here this morning, and he will attend to them. I will not detain you, Mr. Ducaine."

I turned to leave the room, but found myself face to face with a young man in the act of entering it.

"Blenavon!" the Duke exclaimed.

"How are you, sir?" the newcomer answered. "Sorry I didn't arrive in time to see you last night. We motored from King's Lynn, and the whole of this respectable household was in bed."

I knew at once who he was. The Duke looked towards me.

"Ducaine," he said, "this is my son, Lord Blenavon."

Lord Blenavon's smile was evidently meant to be friendly, but his expression belied it. He was slightly taller than his father, and his cast of features was altogether different. His cheeks were pale, almost sunken, his eyes were too close together, and they had the dimness of the roue or the habitual dyspeptic. His lips were too full, his chin too receding, and he was almost bald.

"How are you, Mr. Ducaine?" he said. "Awful hour to be out of bed, isn't it? and all for the slaying of a few fat and innocent birds. Let me see, wasn't I at Magdalen with you?"

"I came up in your last year," I reminded him.

"Ah, yes, I remember," he drawled. "Terrible close worker you were, too. Are you breakfasting down stairs, sir?"

"I think that I had better," the Duke said. "I suppose you brought some men with you?"

"Half a dozen," Lord Blenavon answered, "including his Royal Highness."

The Duke thrust all his letters into his drawer, and locked them up with a little exclamation of relief.

"I will come down with you," he said. "Mr. Ducaine, you will join us."

I would have excused myself, for indeed I was weary, and the thought of a bath and rest at home was more attractive. But the Duke had a way of expressing his wishes in a manner which it was scarcely possible to mistake, and I gathered that he desired me to accept his invitation. We all descended the stairs together.

CHAPTER XI HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS

The long dining-room was almost filled with a troop of guests who had arrived on the previous day. Most of the men were gathered round the huge sideboard, on which was a formidable array of silver-covered hot-water dishes. Places were laid along the flower-decked table for thirty or forty. I stood apart for a few moments whilst the Duke was greeting some of his guests. Ray, who was sitting alone, motioned me to a place by him.

"Come and sit here, Ducaine," he said; "that is," he added, with a sudden sarcastic gleam in his dark eyes, "unless you still have what the novelists call an unconquerable antipathy to me. I don't want to rob you of your appetite."

"I did not expect to see you down here again so soon, Colonel Ray," I answered gravely. "I congratulate you upon your nerves."

Ray laughed softly to himself.

"You would have me go shuddering past the fatal spot, I suppose, with shaking knees and averted head, eh? On the contrary, I have been down on the sands for more than an hour this morning, and have returned with an excellent appetite."

I looked at him curiously.

"I saw you returning," I said. "Your boots looked as though you had been wading in the wet sand. You were not there without a purpose."

"I was not," he admitted. "I seldom do anything without a purpose."

For a moment he abandoned the subject. He proceeded calmly with his breakfast, and addressed a few remarks to a man across the table, a man with short cropped hair and beard, and a shooting dress of sombre black.

"You are quite right," he said, turning towards me suddenly. "I had a purpose in going there. I thought that the gentleman whose untimely fate has enlisted your sympathies might have dropped something which would have been useful to me."

For the moment I forgot this man's kindness to me. I looked at him with a shudder.

"If you are in earnest," I said, "I trust that you were unsuccessful."

I fancied that there was that in his glance which suggested the St.
Bernard looking down on the terrier, and I chafed at it.

"It would have been better for you," he said, grimly, "had my search met with better result."

"For me?" I repeated.

"For you! Yes! The man came to see you. If he had been alive you might have been in his toils by now. He was a very cunning person, and those who sent him were devils."

"How do you know these things?" I asked, amazed.

"From the letters which I ripped from his coat," he answered.

"He came to Braster to see me, then?" I exclaimed.

"Precisely."

"And the letters which you took from him—were they addressed to me?"

"They were."

I was getting angry, but Ray remained imperturbable.

"I think," I said, "you will admit that I have a right to them."

"Not a shadow of a doubt of it," he answered. "In fact, it was so obvious that I destroyed them."

"Destroyed my letters!"

"Precisely! I chose that course rather than allow them to fall into your hands."

"You admit, then," I said, "that I had a right to them."

"Indubitably. But they do not exist."

"You read them, without doubt. You can acquaint me with their contents."

"Some day," he said, "I probably shall. But not yet. Believe me or not, as you choose, but there are certain positions in which ignorance is the only possible safe state. You are in such a position at the present moment."

"Are you," I asked, "my moral guardian?"

"I have at least," he said, "incurred certain responsibilities on your behalf. You could no longer hold your present post and be in communication with the sender of those letters."

My anger died away despite myself. The man's strength and honesty of purpose were things which I could not bring myself to doubt. I continued my breakfast in silence.

"By-the-bye," he remarked presently, "you, too, my young friend, were out early this morning."

"I was writing all night," I answered. "I had documents to put in the safe."

He shot a quick searching glance at me.

"You have been to the safe this morning, then?"

I answered him with a composure at which I inwardly marvelled.

"Certainly! It was the object of my coming here."

"You entered the room with the Duke. Was he in the study at that hour?"

"No, I went upstairs to him. I had a question to ask."

"And you have met Lord Blenavon? What do you think of him?"

"We were at Magdalen together for a term," I answered. "He was good enough to remember me."

Ray smiled, but he did not speak another word to me all the breakfast-time. Once I made a remark to him, and his reply was curt, almost rude. I left the room a few minutes afterwards, and came face to face in the hall with Lady Angela.

"I am glad, Mr. Ducaine," she remarked, "that your early morning labours have given you an appetite. You have been in to breakfast, have you not?"

"Your father was good enough to insist upon it," I answered.

"You have seen him already this morning, then?"

"For a few minutes only," I explained. "I went up to his room."

"I trust so far that everything is going on satisfactorily?" she inquired, raising her eyes to mine.

I did not answer her at once. I was engaged in marvelling at the wonderful pallor of her cheeks.

"So far as I am concerned, I think so," I said. "Forgive me, Lady Angela," I added, "but I think that you must have walked too far this morning. You are very pale."

"I am tired," she admitted.

There was a lounge close at hand. She moved slowly towards it, and sat down. There was no spoken invitation, but I understood that I was permitted to remain with her.

"Do you know," she said, looking round to make sure that we were alone, "I dread these meetings of the Council. I have always the feeling that something terrible will happen. I knew Lord Ronald very well, and his mother was one of my dearest friends. I am sure that he was perfectly innocent. And